Sermon for November 10th, 2013

Genesis 22:1-14

22After these things God tested Abraham. He said to him, ‘Abraham!’ And he said, ‘Here I am.’ 2He said, ‘Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt-offering on one of the mountains that I shall show you.’ 3So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac; he cut the wood for the burnt-offering, and set out and went to the place in the distance that God had shown him. 4On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place far away. 5Then Abraham said to his young men, ‘Stay here with the donkey; the boy and I will go over there; we will worship, and then we will come back to you.’ 6Abraham took the wood of the burnt-offering and laid it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. So the two of them walked on together. 7Isaac said to his father Abraham, ‘Father!’ And he said, ‘Here I am, my son.’ He said, ‘The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for a burnt-offering?’ 8Abraham said, ‘God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt-offering, my son.’ So the two of them walked on together.

9 When they came to the place that God had shown him, Abraham built an altar there and laid the wood in order. He bound his son Isaac, and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 10Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to kill his son. 11But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven, and said, ‘Abraham, Abraham!’ And he said, ‘Here I am.’ 12He said, ‘Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.’ 13And Abraham looked up and saw a ram, caught in a thicket by its horns. Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt-offering instead of his son. 14So Abraham called that place ‘The Lord will provide’; as it is said to this day, ‘On the mount of the Lord it shall be provided.’

On Human Sacrifice

For a long time (probably as far back as when my oldest son, Grady was born) I've had a real problem with this particular story in the bible. What kind of sick and twisted God tells a father to kill his son, and then at the last minute says, "just kidding--I wanted to see whether you'd really go through with it or not!"

I'm not the only one who has a problem with this story. Richard Dawkins, an Oxford professor and well-known atheist, has this to say about today's scripture passage: "A modern moralist cannot help but wonder how a child could ever recover from such psychological trauma. By the standards of modern morality, this disgraceful story is an example simultaneously of child abuse, bullying in two asymmetrical power relationships, and the first recorded use of the Nuremberg defence: I was only obeying orders."

Richard Dawkins and I probably don't agree on a whole lot of things, but he raises some pretty legitimate concerns. As Christians, we point to Abraham as a model of faith in God, because he trusted God, was obedient to God's voice, to God's impossible request. And yet...if you were to tell me today that you heard God's voice telling you to sacrifice your child... as your pastor I would tell you to have your head examined first, and worry about your faith later. So why do we let Abraham off the hook so easily? Or for that matter, why do we let God off the hook so easily?

As with most difficult passages in the Bible, before we judge anyone or anything we need to take a closer look at the ancient historical and cultural contexts in which they were first written and received. Human sacrifice was a reality in almost all ancient cultures: Aztec, Inca, Asian, African, Indian, Slavic, Polynesian, Egyptian, and European, to name just a few. Sacrifices were almost always made to the gods, and this makes sense. The gods were perceived to rule over all the things people had no control over--weather, crop yields, sickness, fertility.

What do you give a god you're trying to influence? The same thing you'd give anyone else, something of value. The more value, the better the sacrifice: fruit, vegetables, grains for starters, small animals...large animals...finally, human beings, the most valuable sacrifice. The most desperate sacrifice for the greatest need. How do you sacrifice something? Well to give something to another person, I just place it in their hands. Where are God's hands? The only way to get something to God is to destroy it, to make it no longer here.

All of this makes perfect sense to a prehistoric mind. It's difficult for us because we are so far removed from it. But to Abraham, this would have been perfectly normal. Notice that Abraham doesn't complain, doesn't even question! Just a few chapters ago, God told Abraham of his plans to destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham is shocked--destroy an entire city? That's just not right! Abraham argues with God. He says, "Far be it from you to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked! Far be that from you! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?"

But when God says, "sacrifice your only son" Abraham doesn't even blink an eye. It's not because of his great faith. It's because in Abraham's world, that's just what gods tell you to do! God has made Abraham an enormous promise--that his descendants will be numbered like the stars in the sky. Remember, the greatest promise calls for the greatest sacrifice. Makes perfect sense.

What doesn't make sense, what is strange, bizarre, out of time and out of place...is when God says "Stop! Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me." In other words, I don't need you to sacrifice your son in order to prove your faith. I'm not that kind of God. Here, God changes the rules. God calls his people to be set apart, to be different than the tribes and cultures that surround them. Years later, this prohibition against human sacrifice is written into the law of Moses. And in the book of the Prophet Micah, God finally answers that burning question (pun intended) humans have been asking with their sacrifices, "What do you want, God?" Micah says, "With what shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt-offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with tens of thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

This is the new sacrifice: Do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God. Notice that only one of those three things is directed at God, and that's humility. The other two (justice and kindness) are things directed at other people, at our neighbors. We say, "God, what do you want?" and God says, "I'm good. But if you really want to help me...help each other."